Putin Seals Pipeline Deal, Meets With Merkel

By Anatoly Medetsky

Staff Writer

Published: September 9, 2005 (Issue # 1103)

MOSCOW — President Vladimir Putin on Thursday broke new ground in Russian foreign policy by meeting not only with German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder , but also with his likely replacement, opposition leader Angel Merkel.

Putin and Schroeder attended the signing of a landmark agreement in Berlin between Gazprom and Germany’s E.ON and BASF to build a $5 billion gas pipeline under the Baltic Sea.

Once in full operation, the new pipeline — which bypasses Belarus, Poland and Ukraine — will handle one third of Gazprom’s current annual exports to Europe. The pipeline, due for completion in 2010, will have two branches that combined will carry 55 billion cubic meters a year.

The pipeline will run from Vyborg near St. Petersburg to Greifswald in northeast Germany. At a later point, the pipeline will be extended to the Netherlands and the U.K.

Putin also met with Merkel, the leader of the opposition Christian Democratic Union, at the Russian embassy.

The meetings came ahead of Germany’s Sept. 18 parliamentary elections that look set to make Merkel the country’s next chancellor, either at the head of a conservative government or as the leader of the largest party in a grand coalition with Schroeder’s Social Democrats.

The latest opinion poll, conducted this week, gave Merkel’s CDU a lead of 8 percentage points over the Social Democrats.

During the election campaign, Merkel has promised to take a more conservative stance in relations with Russia compared to Schroeder, who is a firm ally of Putin’s. Schroeder and Putin have met a total of 32 times during their time in office.

Merkel, an East German, has said she would pay more attention to Poland and Ukraine, and would not overlook their interests when dealing with Russia.

Putin’s evenhanded treatment of Schroeder and Merkel stands in contrast to his stance during foreign elections last year, when he openly backed the incumbents and their allies in the Ukrainian and U.S. presidential elections.

The different approach appears to be aimed at pre-empting a possible chill in relations with Berlin in the event of a Merkel victory and at ensuring that the Baltic gas pipeline goes ahead, regardless of which party or parties form the next German government. Under a Merkel-led coalition government, Schroeder could still play a role in policy, particularly in shaping relations with Russia.

At their meeting, Putin and Merkel both said they saw Russian-German relations developing positively.

“Regardless of the internal political processes in Germany, this desire for the positive development of our relations is intact,” Putin said, Interfax reported.

Merkel said she was also keen on cooperation.

“If I manage to come to power, we will develop a strategic partnership,” she said, according to the Russian translation carried by Interfax. “I adhere to the traditions of Chancellor [Konrad] Adenauer.”

Speaking earlier in the day at a joint news conference with Schroeder, Putin said that a Merkel victory would not affect bilateral relations.

“Germany and Russia have always had good relations. It’s good if they are supported by good personal relations, but ... relations between Russia and Germany should exist and develop regardless of such friendship,” he said.

Putin said he hoped to remain friends with Schroeder after the elections.

When Putin was asked if he was supporting Schroeder’s campaign by meeting with him ahead of the elections, he replied, “You know that I have a planned meeting with Angela Merkel. Why don’t you ask if I support her?”

Putin said last week that his visit was not aimed at backing Schroeder or that it constituted interference in the campaign.

“We don’t meddle … also, it is pointless and silly to stop all contacts just because they have elections,” Putin said at his residence near the Black Sea resort of Sochi on Aug. 29.

At his meeting with Merkel, Putin noted that his visit came just five days ahead of the 50th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between the Soviet Union and West Germany, on Sept. 13. He said that former chancellors Adenauer and Helmut Kohl, both from Merkel’s CDU, had favored good relations with Russia.

Merkel replied by saying that she would have visited Russia to celebrate the anniversary if it had not coincided with the German election campaign.

It was Merkel who proposed the meeting, Putin aide Sergei Prikhodko said, RIA-Novosti reported Thursday.

Roland Goetz, a Russia analyst at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs, said that Putin’s visit could qualify as an intervention in the campaign as it gave Schroeder an opportunity to “make a show for the media.” But the effort would have “no significant effect” on German voters, he said by telephone from Berlin on Thursday.

Last year, Putin made a series of statements in favor of President George W. Bush during the United States’ closely fought election campaign. Putin also made public appearances with the Kremlin’s favored candidate in Ukraine’s disputed presidential elections, Viktor Yanukovych, but not with his successful rival, Viktor Yushchenko.

Putin broke new ground by meeting with Merkel, said Boris Shmelyov, head of the center for comparative political research at the Russian Academy of Sciences. “It’s the first such step in Russian foreign policy,” he said. “In previous years, there were no cases when the head of state met the leaders of the opposition in other countries.”

By meeting Merkel, Putin was following the example of Western leaders, in part because he does not want Merkel to block the Gazprom agreement if she becomes chancellor, Shmelyov said.

For the Kremlin, the importance of Germany, Russia’s largest trading partner and creditor, extends far beyond the gas pipeline deal. Germany has advocated Russia’s interests in the European Union and NATO, Shmelyov said.

In 2003, Russia, Germany and France also opposed the U.S.-led war in Iraq.

Some of the sheen could be taken off of the German-Russian strategic friendship if Merkel wins the elections, Shmelyov and Goetz said, as she has criticized Schroeder for sacrificing ties with Germany’s eastern neighbors by cozying up to Moscow and has promised to pursue a more even-handed approach. Merkel has also vowed to repair ties with the United States.

“Merkel is more skeptical about Russia and closer to the United States,” Shmelyov said.

Germany could review its policy on Iraq to support the United States, and listen more to Poland, the Baltic states and CIS countries in their relations with Russia, Shmelyov said. A Merkel-led Germany would also express more criticism about Russia’s internal affairs, over Chechnya and the state of democracy, he said.

And Merkel would not likely repeat Schroeder’s description of Putin as a “democrat through and through,” Goetz said.

But Germany’s energy needs and economic interests will prevent it from drifting too far away from Russia, Shmelyov said.